Semifinal-bound Halep wins 12th straight Wimbledon match, ousting Anisimova

Simona Halep's first appearance at Wimbledon since winning the title three years ago is going just as well as it did the last time.

The 16th-seeded Romanian reached the semifinals and stretched her winning streak at the All England Club to 12 matches by beating Amanda Anisimova 6-2, 6-4 on Wednesday on Centre Court in London.

Halep missed the chance to defend her title at Wimbledon twice, first in 2020 when the tournament was cancelled because of the coronavirus pandemic and then again in 2021 when she had to sit out with a left calf injury.

In the semifinals, Halep will face Elena Rybakina, the 17th seed who beat Ajla Tomljanovic 4-6, 6-2, 6-3 on No. 1 Court.

Rybakina, a 23-year-old Kazakh, is playing at Wimbledon for only the second time in her career. She lost in the fourth round last year.

Halep is making her 10th appearance at Wimbledon and has reached the semifinals for the third time. She is the only Grand Slam champion left in the women's tournament.

"I'm very emotional right now, because it means a lot to be back in the semis," Halep said.

'I believed in myself'

The match against Anisimova appeared to be as straightforward as her first four victories at this year's tournament — all came in straight sets. But the 20th-seeded American broke Halep when she was serving for the match at 5-2.

Anisimova then had three more break points when Halep again served for the match at 5-4, but the Romanian won five straight points to finish the match.

Halep injured her calf more than a year ago, forcing her to withdraw from the French Open and Wimbledon. She started working with Patrick Mouratoglou, the former coach of Serena Williams, in April.

In the other match, Rybakina dropped her first set of the grass-court tournament but broke her Australian opponent early in the second and third sets. She finished the match with 15 aces.

"I started a bit slow. I didn't serve that well. Maybe I was nervous," Rybakina said. "Ajla, she played really well, she was defending really good and I just tried to focus on my serve to find my way and I found it."

Nadal battles pain, needs 5 sets to down Fritz

Wincing from abdominal pain, unable to play his customary relentless style of tennis, Rafael Nadal though he might need to stop playing in the Wimbledon quarter-finals against Taylor Fritz.

Up in the Centre Court stands, Nadal's father was waving his arms, motioning to the 22-time Grand Slam champion to quit. Not surprisingly, perhaps, he didn't listen. Nadal stayed out there, adjusted his service motion and his strategy — and figured out a way to win.

With much of the crowd roaring and standing after Nadal's best strokes, he twice erased one-set deficits against the 11th-seeded Fritz and emerged with 3-6, 7-5, 3-6, 7-5, 7-6 (10-4) victory Wednesday to reach his eighth semifinal at the All England Club.

"For a lot of moments," Nadal said, "I was thinking, 'Maybe I will not be able to finish the match."'

He did complete it, but said he couldn't be sure whether he will be able to play Friday against Nick Kyrgios, a 27-year-old Australian who earned his Grand Slam semifinal debut with a 6-4, 6-3, 7-6 (5) victory over Cristian Garin of Chile. Kyrgios is the lowest ranked and first unseeded men's semifinalist since 2008. He is currently ranked 40th.

"I don't know exactly what I have. It's clear something's not right," said Nadal, who will get tests Thursday for an issue that first cropped up nearly a week ago but got much worse at 3-1 in the first set against Fritz. "I'm obviously worried."

Nadal got to his 38th career major semifinal by denying what would have been a first such appearance for Fritz, who beat Nadal in the hard-court final at Indian Wells, California, in March. That ended a 20-match winning streak for Nadal, who was bothered that day by a painful rib injury.

This time, the problem was a muscle in his stomach area, which had some athletic tape. Nadal left the court with a trainer for a medical timeout while up 4-3 in the second set; Fritz paced around the baseline, waiting.

A doctor gave Nadal some pills; the trainer tried to relax the muscle.

"They can't do much," Nadal said. "Nothing can be fixed when you have a thing like this."

When action resumed, Nadal clearly was compromised. It was hard not to think: Might he give up?

Nadal acknowledged that went through his mind. Fritz did, too.

"It definitely made me kind of think. I kind of stopped being as aggressive," the 24-year-old American said. "I feel like I let it kind of get to me a little bit."

He pretty much handed over the second set of what would become a four-hour, 21-minute contest under a sky of slate clouds. After Fritz took the third set, his big serve got broken three times in the next.

Nadal occasionally would watch a ball off Fritz's orange racket fly by. Nadal couldn't move the way he usually does. His trademark grunts of "Uhhhh!" were rare. He didn't generate the usual zip on his serves, which dipped from a high of 120 mph to barely above 100 mph. He sought to end exchanges with a quick-strike forehand or a drop shot — sometimes with success, often not.

Still, he summoned his best for last, grabbing a 5-0 lead in the closing tiebreaker — the first-to-10, win-by-two format starting at 6-all in a fifth set is new to Wimbledon this year — and then five of the last six points.

Fritz's take on the tiebreaker? "I just got destroyed," he said.

Nadal extended his unbeaten mark in 2022 Grand Slam matches to 19-0 as he seeks to add a trophy at Wimbledon to his triumphs at the Australian Open in January and French Open in June. For everything he's accomplished, the 36-year-old Spaniard never has won the first three Slam titles of a season.

Nadal, who won Wimbledon in 2008 and 2010, leads Kyrgios 6-3 in their head-to-head series, but they are even at 1-1 at Wimbledon: Kyrgios, just 19 and ranked 144th, announced himself to the world by stunning Nadal in 2014; Nadal won the rematch in 2019.

Gauff and Sock lose in mixed doubles

Coco Gauff and Jack Sock have been eliminated from the mixed doubles tournament at Wimbledon.

Both Gauff and Sock reached the third round in the singles tournaments.

Stosur and Ebden will face either Sania Mirza and Mate Pavic or Desirae Krawczyk and Neal Skupski in the final.